By Dan McCue
Staff Writer

The upcoming Democratic presidential debate in Charleston will likely have an economic impact on the city for more than a week and total $30 million if not more when all is said and done, said Patrick Norton, a spokesman for the S.C. Democratic Party.

Norton based his assertion on his participation in the planning the recent Democratic presidential candidates debate in Orangeburg, he said.

That event ultimately drew more than 700 journalists and hundreds more volunteers, including members of the Young Democrats organization from across the United States, to the campus of South Carolina State University, making it one of the most widely attended presidential debates in U.S. history, according to many estimates.

Since the Charleston debate, which will be broadcast live by CNN on July 23, is the first of six such events sanctioned by the Democratic National Committee, the event is likely to inspire a similar response, Norton said.

The debate, which is being cosponsored by the region’s newest major corporate citizen, Google, is the first such event being held in the port city in modern memory.

On May 17, Columbia played host to a Fox News debate featuring the Republican candidates for president; the full Democratic field came together for their first-in-the-South debate in Orangeburg on April 26.

While there continues to be no word on the venue or moderators of the event, Norton said wherever its held, activity related to the debate will likely begin in Charleston several days to a week before the event.

“Using Orangeburg as the example, what happens is we start setting up the media filing center adjacent to the debate site first, putting in the risers, dropping cables, powering up the wireless Internet access, so that reporters can just walk right in and start working as soon as they arrive,” he explained.

“The next thing that will happen is CNN will begin to arrive, setting up their trucks and preparing the venue for the broadcast. By the time reporters and volunteers begin arriving en mass, 24 to 48 hours before the actual debate, the stage has been set up and the campaigns will begin establishing a presence in the city.”

Norton said even after the debate, CNN will likely spend at least a day in Charleston striking the debate set, and many reporters will spend at least some of the following day in town filing their follow-up stories.

YouTube/Google’s sponsorship of the debate is a coincidence that is allowing the search engine giant to co-host a major political event in one of its newest home states, said Adam Kovacevich, Google’s Washington, D.C.-based spokesman for public policy and political issues.

But he also promised that the event, like many that have transpired in Charleston over the past 400 years, is going to make history.

“We’re describing it as the first-ever, voter-generated presidential debate,” Kovacevich said.

“Our vision, given that YouTube is a medium of citizen involvement, is to have at least some questions posed to the candidates directly from YouTube users,” he said.

“That’s going to make this debate a little different from the one’s we’re all accustomed to, and as you can imagine, many of the details and solutions to logistical issues are still to be determined,” Kovacevich said. “This really started from Google and You Tube wanting to cosponsor at least one Democratic and one Republican debate during this election cycle.

“At the same time, because they were receiving so many requests to debate, the Democrat candidates’ campaigns asked the Democratic National Committee to sanction six debates in key states, holding basically one a month up to the start of the primary season. To have it all come together like this, and to be co-hosting the event in Charleston, is tremendously exciting.”

Google is continuing to talk with the campaigns and national committee for the Republican candidates in hopes on sponsoring one of their debates as well, Kovacevich said.

“So we’ll have a lot more details to talk about in the coming weeks,” he said.

What’s also unclear is how much of an opportunity the average Charlestonian will actually have to mix with the candidates.

While most candidates, if not all, will hold events around the area in conjunction with their debate appearance, the fact that both New York Sen. Hillary Clinton and Illinois Sen. Barack Obama have secret service protection somewhat limits their accessibility.

One final Democratic presidential candidate debate is currently being planned for Jan. 24, just days before the state’s Jan. 29 Democratic primary. It is being sponsored by the Congressional Black Caucus.

Dan McCue is a staff writer for the Business Journal. E-mail him at dmccue@charlestonbusiness.com.

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